‘DOWNHILL FROM THERE’

Trump Sought Legal Advice From Right-Wing Activist—Who Is NOT a Lawyer

The president of right-wing group Judicial Watch reportedly told Trump he shouldn’t have given any docs to the National Archives and to stonewall them going forward.

Judicial Watch president and MAGA loyalist Tom Fitton began providing legal advice to former President Donald Trump soon after the National Archive acknowledged in February it had taken 15 boxes of records from Mar-a-Lago, CNN reported on Thursday. Fitton, who is not an attorney but is one of the worst purveyors of misinformation about Trump’s 2020 election loss, reportedly advised the ex-president not to provide any additional records to the archives. The right-wing media figure also reportedly told Trump that his team shouldn’t have let the archives “strong-arm” them into returning the other records. “The moment Tom got in the boss’ ear, it was downhill from there,” one person close to Trump told CNN. Other sources added that Trump “began obsessing over Fitton’s arguments” and “even asked Fitton at one point to brief his attorneys.” This all took place while Trump publicly claimed to be cooperating with the government over the documents. The former president is currently under investigation for violations of the Espionage Act and illegally keeping classified material, according to the search warrant used to raid his home this month. The redacted affidavit behind that search warrant will be released by the Justice Department on Friday.